Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?

[devonin]

But in our modern eyes, after seeing the film "Titanic" it makes a lot more sense.

OH, I thought it was predicting the sinking of the Lusitania. Curses.

Okay, point made, now I'll make a more actual response.

If this were written in 1000 A.D., the people of that time would have a hard time figuring out what it was about, and there would surely be many different strange interpretations.

Then it was a failed prophecy. The purpose of a prophecy (in the sense of "true" prophecy) is to predict a future event in a way that allows some degree of meaningdul understanding in regards to that event. Prophecy reveals fate, it doesn't obscure reality. Look at the role played by prophecy in the Greek epics. Everything that was predicted to happen was both clear "You yourself are not one who shall live long, but now already death and powerful destiny are standing beside you, to go down under the hands of Aiakos' great son, Achilleus" understandable at a level that didn't require hindsight, and not something using terms that made no sense to the people of the time.

it seems like there have been many times where God has helped me in my life.

So God broke His promise to mankind to grant us free will to let us do as we choose? If God poked His hand in and interfered any time we asked nicely, then He is shaping events that He promised to allow to take their own course. How do you reconcile the concept of free will with the concept of direct intercession in human affairs by God?

Jesus' death was a historical event. Jesus was written of by a number of witnesses, and although you may say it was only four, Luke was not an eyewitness, but put together a history from eyewitnesses, who also proclaimed that they had seen Jesus live again.

Begging the question. The bible's validity as a source is what is under question. Since, as you said, the lack of a resurrected Jesus makes the whole thing fall apart, OF COURSE the bible states clearly and repeatedly that there was a resurrected Jesus. The thing you need to do to show proof is to show extra-biblical accounts of the resurrection of Jesus.

Jesus' death and resurrection has to have been literal, as it truly shows that he is the son of God, to have risen on his own.

You ought to replace the phrase "has to have been" to "desperately needs to have been" to make that a true statement. Unfortunately, you can't get an 'is' from an 'ought'

I mean, if Jesus isn't really God and didn't really die on the cross, then he is one of the most arrogant people who ever lived. Or totally crazy, and I don't think someone that crazy could come up with teachings that last thousands of years.

Or he was a deluded individual who was interested in founding a religion, gaining followers and understood that you need to sound suitably impressive to impress people around you? Or more to the point, the second-hand accounts of what Jesus said or didn't say are not quite accurate reflections of what he intended to have said. The majority of statements in the bible attributed to Jesus do not deal with his assumed divinity, or any superiority to those around him. Frankly, my own readings of the bible suggest that the effect God was going for with Jesus was that he be a normal human man the exact same as everyone else. In that case, the ability to perform miracles is certainly not included in the package. If the purpose of Jesus was to show everyone the proper way to live in order to get into the kingdom of heaven, he needed to be a perfectly normal person, to show us how we, perfectly normal people, can do it.

If he had divine grace, never sinned, performed miracles at a whim and basically got to cheat to get into heaven, then his existance is useless for us as a guide. He needs to be a normal, fallible, prone to sins and greed and selfishness person just like us.

As for his message, I think you'll find that he didn't "come up with" teachings that lasted thousands of years. The vast majority of his teachings are exactly the same as ones you'd find in a whole host of other religious and moral teachings predating him by many years.

You think "If you're nice to people, they'll be nice to you" is a brand new idea that Jesus had?